Guatemalan Highlands and Xela
Trip Start
Sep 07, 2006
1
29
52
Trip End
Ongoing
Xela,
Guatemala
Monday, February 12, 2007
After San Marcos, we headed to Chichicastango in the Highlands. We had heard some travel warnings about the highlands but it turned out to be a highlight of the trip so far. On the shuttle there we met a Guatemalan family. Silvia, Angel and their adorable little 16 month old Alan. Iīm very glad to be traveling with someone who speaks Spanish. Itīs been a godsend. They invited us to play basketball with them later and came to pick us up from our hotel. We met many members of their family and had a good game of basketball. My height advantage wasnīt of much use as they were all fanastic players and Iīm somewhat out of shape. It was great fun though.
Our purpose of the trip to Chichicastango was to see the market on Sunday. Siliva met us the next morning to guide us around the market which was fantastic. We all bought some souvenirs although I was very restrained thinking of the weight of my pack. The fabrics here in Guatemala are amazingly beautiful. The traditional costumes are breathtaking. Once we left Antigua we began to see more and more people wearing the traditional dress. Silvia wore her traditional dress when she met us to take us to the market, although she later told us that she doesnīt like wearing it because it is uncomfortable and only did it for our benefit. After touring the market we went to see her home. It was unfortunate to see. The three of them lived in a single room much smaller than just my bedroom back home. It was hard to imagine living there and I donīt know what they will do once they have another child. Even so it was interesting to see that they had a nice stereo, television, DVD player and playstation. Iīm thankful to have had a chance to see their home and have gotten a closer idea to how many of the people there. Afterwards, we took Silvia and her son to lunch before catching the first bus we needed to take to get to Xela.
The first bus was the worse chicken bus ride iīve had so far. Far too many people and I spent the ride trying to hang on when the driver took turns really fast. The little boy on the same bench as me was sick, thankfully his father had a plastic bag with him. All that said the chicken buses arenīt really that bad. I think Iīve had worse rides on my commute home on the tube when I was living in London.
Weīve had a string of luck lately. We had a couple connections to make and were lucky to make it to Xela as we got out of Chichicastango pretty late. Once in Xela we were on our way to the hostel we had picked when we crossed a couple travellers who were just there and told us they were full. We luckily ran into an Australian girl on the street who took us to a place she knew of that had space available (and it was cheap). After we had checked in she led us to a cute cafe where there was live music and some of the best hot chocolate.
We are planning on making our way down to the hot springs nearby today. We have another night in Xela before heading back to Anigua and then making our way to Coban and up to Tikal.
